By Clint Chan Tack Friday, November 21 2008

PLANNING, Housing and Environment Minister Dr Emily Gaynor Dick-Forde yesterday said the homes of Natalie Alladin, three, and Barbara Emmanuel, 67, were built on lands which are “unsuitable for built developments.”

Emmanuel and Natalie died on Sunday and Tuesday respectively when their homes were destroyed in landslides caused by heavy rains.

Noting that planning standards for various developments “were not maintained by different ministers over the years,” Dick-Forde denied she was accusing any of her predecessors, among them Diego Martin West MP Dr Keith Rowley or TT High Commissioner to Canada Camille Robinson-Regis, of breaching the Town and Country Act.

As she expressed condolences to Emmanuel’s and Natalie’s families at the post-Cabinet news conference at the Prime Minister’s Diplomatic Centre in St Ann’s, Dick-Forde said: “We are really not so much looking at blame but looking into the future; how we can in fact assist in ensuring disasters of this nature do not occur.”

Dick-Forde said ministry teams which visited the locations of Emmanuel’s and Natalie’s homes in Maraval and St Ann’s respectively reported that, “these sites were on the type of soil that is unsuitable for built developments and should be maintained perpetually under permanent vegetative cover.” The minister said clearing such lands for housing or agriculture “results in slippage, slumping and landslides.”

“Additionally, both sites appeared to have inadequate drainage for runoff of water from the slopes which contribute to landslides,” she added.

Government has been making an effort to relocate persons living in such unsafe locations to safer locations, Dick-Forde said, adding that the Ministry will publish a comprehensive report on all hillside sites which were affected by this week’s heavy rains to give the public an idea of the proper planning guidelines which must be followed in undertaking such developments.